


Adora & Parentification

by cronaisawriter



Series: Trauma/Abuse and Media [7]
Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Character Study, Child Abuse, Childhood Trauma, Family Dynamics, Gen, Meta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-08
Updated: 2019-09-08
Packaged: 2020-10-12 08:15:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20561114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cronaisawriter/pseuds/cronaisawriter
Summary: A look at rather Adora was Parentified by Shadow Weaver as a child.





	Adora & Parentification

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Simon+Buchan](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Simon%2BBuchan).

> CW: Child Abuse, child soldiers, Emotional/psychological abuse, referenced alcoholism, and child neglect. 
> 
> This was a request by Simon+Buchan 
> 
> Request: Since we're doing prompts, I read an essay https://thehonorofgrayskull.dreamwidth.org/3422.html on how Adora was Parentified by Shadow Weaver, and how that lead to her present behaviour. It seems a little too neat to explain everything but still like a good match. In particular, this helps explain to me why there would be a hidden preexisting rift between Adora and Catra, at least from Catra's side, explaining why she would turn on Adora so fast. I'm interested to hear your thoughts!

_ This is partially a response to  [ this post  ](https://redrikki.dreamwidth.org/36316.html#cutid1) by  Redrikki on DreamWidth. _

Adora does have a parentification part in her emotional & psychological abuse by Shadow Weaver. Mainly in the way, Adora has responsibility placed on her as a child she can’t handle and is expected to be in charge of others. She shows a large degree of feeling that she has to be in charge and protect others. 

Mainly this shows up in her forced responsibility of Catra. The abuse placed her as an authority figure for Catra as much as and if not more than a peer and sibling. There are some more direct “mother/parent” dynamic in the support she offers when they are young kids though as time passed the forced unemotionality of life in the Horde took away some of this emotionality since weakness is quashed. 

This parentification leaves Adora being a perfectionist, a need to control, a lot of respect for the rules of how things are done and feeling like she is responsible for other people. We see the need to be the perfect soldier and to protect others carry on to her other life. She feels like if she isn’t playing the hero she was told she has to be then she is failing. Adora takes responsibility for others failings like she was taught to for Catra, this makes her deal with a lot of self-esteem problems and anxiety. 

The rift is very visible with Catra too as common with parentified siblings Catra resents her being trying to get her to fall in line and listen. Adora has some power over her witch makes Catra’s need to rebel go against Adora. The way Adora acted as her only emotional support also makes the lack of trust shown by Adora causes profound reactions. Adora deal with this loss of contact by continuously feeling like she is responsible for Catra’s mistakes and wants her back up until the end of season 3.

Martyrdom another common parentification trait is also seen. Adora wants to throw herself on the pyre a lot and has to be the one to do it, this, however, is important to plot as she is the chosen one. There doesn’t seem to be a real ability for her to reject this job. And the environments of child soldiers and magic hero alter this from a dynamic in a normal family. I mean it's sci-fi and it's got some great fantasy elements on top of some of the real-world elements also removed from general psychology. 

I think there is one major part of parentification that doesn't show up. Shadow Weaver is a consistent figure of authority who does offer guidance, parentification is not in reality usually making a child into a tool, which is the method of psychological abuse we see, but turning a kid into an adult as a support figure. Adora is highly adultified and parentified but she is even more so  **objectified** .

A way to understand this might be:

_ Objectified: I am the possession of a bigger person and have to be who they told me to be _

_ Parentified: I have to fill in for the missing piece. I need to be who they can’t be and who they need me to be _ . 

Generally, a parentified child is parenting the other kids but also has to parent an adult. Adora is not materially or emotionally parenting Shadow Weaver. So she doesn’t take on a full adult role between them. She is also not literally a parent like Nani from  _ Lilo and Stitch _ , in this case, it's a complete absence due to their parents' early death and huge age gap. 

Shadow Weaver is perfectly responsible and totally in control, not a disorganized personality. A Caregiver/parent's own trauma, mental illness, addiction or just absence tend to be the parents who form a parentified relationship. Emotional immaturity is also often an aspect in this, an extremely lax parenting style and/or treating a kid as a peer as often or more than a kid. I think extremely good examples in media are Fiona Galagher in  _ Shameless _ , Molly Johnson in  _ Swing Vote _ , Helena in  _ The Ocean of Helena Lee _ and Rory Gilmore in  _ Gilmore Girls _ . The parents are unable to be a parent, authority or guiding force. Shadow Weaver, on the other hand, is a force of almost complete control over Adora, emotionally absent of course and expects self-reliance but the self-reliance is pushed into the brain due to psychological manipulation, not by default. 

Another key aspect is emotional enmeshment the child has to be more mature things like job stress and even sexual/romantic relationships by adults are expected to be understood by the kids. Essentially boundaries are too weak instead of with Shadow Weaver the boundaries are thick because she is not letting them be kids with her using affection very sparingly. So while Adora’s whole identity is based on who she is told she has to be making her identity unstable, it’s not really because of role reversal but extreme roles of authority and subordination. 

In Redrikki’s post, she mentions how Adora tries to reform her bond with Shadow Weaver with light hope but a parentified child isn’t really going to seek out the same dynamic. They are more likely to look for a more traditional parent to fill the missing role or reject the need for guidance sense they never needed it as a kid why now? 

She is expected to play one role and this is actually replicated by her next environment. I don’t think even by shedding some of the ingrained guilt she can really move on from this objectified state till she is no longer in the role of someone's weapon. A Horde weapon to start with but now she is the rebellion's weapon/leader and a First One's weapon. We will also see if she will blame herself for Angella’s death which I think could just shift her guilt from Catra to being the next Mara witch she still fears. 

A way, however, this also fits is that the powerful moments of rejecting Light Hope and Shadow Weaver is very much “you don’t own me”, “I won’t be controlled by you” and “I’m my own person” instead of a “you were never there for me”, “I shouldn't have had to care for you/them” and “I was the child, you were the adult”.

She is forced to take on a parent role with Catra, but she is not the parent of Shadow Weaver she is seen as a possession. Redrikki notes the objectification aspect in her being a tool but I think misses that these aren’t the same kind of emotional position I think. I also think she is a literal child soldier, not just a metaphorical one (i agree with her sources that all childhood trauma can feel like at war) which is going to steal a child’s innocence and make them have played an adult role way before they are ready, but the psychology of the child of an alcoholic and a child soldier isn’t the same. 

I also think anxiety, panic attacks, hypervigilance, a need to control everything, and identity issues are developmental trauma symptoms as a whole. These are dynamics within child abuse and trauma which is always important. And as I noted before within the sci-fi context some things are shifted because of non-realistic portions and even the realistic concepts like imperialism and child soldiers are on a huge scale. It is meant to be grand and awesome, which it is in my opinion. 

Also, I object when people don’t denote Shadow Weaver as a mother or at least primary caregiver. I think we don’t want to recognize her as a parent, but to not at least understand she was their primary caregiver since birth and Adora even references her role sense she does “mother stuff”. Rather victims of abuse call their primary caregivers by mom and dad and refer to their family of origin as "family" in an emotional sense is up to them, but I think recognizing that Adora, Catra & Shadow Weaver function as a familial unit is important.

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry this is so late, it took me a while to get around to it had a lot going on, and other ideas filling my brain. Hope you still like it though!
> 
> This was kinda funny I recently did some reading/thinking on this in my work with abuse survivors looking at covert sexual abuse which has parentification and partnerifcation as part of it. 
> 
> This struck an emotional resonance when writing. In my life, I was the Catra to my sisters Adora, so there were some feel there lol. But I hope I didn't project too much whoops.


End file.
